Iran: Science Minister Says University No Place For 'Dissidents'

Iran's Minister of Science and Technology has stressed once again that students who were involved in the 2009 protests will not be allowed to study in Iranian universities and that Iran's institutions of higher education will not be run according to Western standards.

Minister Kamran Daneshjoo gave a speech on Thursday at Shahroud University, slamming the reaction to his earlier statement that dissidents must be kept from attending university. He said: "I stress once again, those who were active in the sedition have no place in the university."

The Iranian establishment refers to the 2009 mass protests triggered by allegations of fraud in the presidential elections as "sedition."

The crackdown on these protests included a heavy clampdown on student activists, and numerous arrests along with suspensions and expulsions from university.

The Science Minister said: "We must fear the university that trains our youth with Western standards." Daneshjoo once again emphasized the move toward segregating the genders in universities, adding that it is not acceptable that 33 years after the Revolution, Iran has only one single-gender university.

The Al-Zahra University is Iran's sole single-gendered university and only accepts women students.